Jorey Danos keeps a memento from the disaster in a jam jar with a skull-and-crossbones on it. The jar holds a viscous brown liquid. "That's oil that I took from the Gulf of Mexico after the spill," Danos says. The oil has hung over the life of the man from Louisiana ever since. Two years after the worst oil disaster in US history, few traces of the spill are evident along the coast, and that is partly thanks to Danos, who was one of those who helped clean up the mess.
But the extensive environmental damage is still being tallied for its toll on people, the Gulf and on coastal communities, turning the disaster's second anniversary on Friday into a renewed topic of discussion ahead of Earth Day on Sunday. Danos is now sick and is hoping to benefit from the compensation fund agreed to in March between the energy multinational BP and the legal representatives of around 100,000 people affected by the spill. On Wednesday, the parties presented details to a New Orleans judge.
"At the age of 32, I'm walking with a cane," Danos says from the sofa of the mobile home he shares with his wife and three daughters in the small town of Chackbay, in the Louisiana swamplands. On the laptop on his knees, he shows a video filmed by his wife. It shows him shivering and writhing with cramps on the floor.
"That's how it began last August," Danos says, detailing the cramps, feelings of anxiety, sleeplessness, coughing and weight loss that he has suffered. He says he lost 20 kilograms in four weeks from what his doctors have termed "poisoning." Danos shows the results of his blood tests - benzene, ethylbenzene, hexane. They are chemicals to be found either in crude oil or in Corexit, a dispersant used to clean up after the spill. "They are all flowing through my veins as we speak," Danos says.
The explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform on April 20, 2010 claimed the lives of 11 workers and spewed some 780 million litres of oil into the Gulf, threatening around 1,000 kilometres of coastline. The leak at BP's Macondo wellhead, some 1,500 metres down, was finally sealed after 88 days - but not before serious damage was done to the environment and the economy of five states.
Danos was one of around 48,000 assistants employed to battle the disaster. Many of them are now complaining of health ill effects. During the clean-up, Danos was aboard a cutter just 12 kilometres from the platform, working under contract for BP to contain the spill with barriers. The pay offered - 300 dollars a day - was a considerable sum for a day labourer. His dream of earning good money for his family convinced him to put up with the hard conditions for four months.
"I got sprayed four different times in that episode," Danos says, referring to the light aircraft passing overhead spraying dispersant on the spill. He says today that the protective clothing provided was ineffective. "They didn't want us to wear respirators because they felt it would bring attention to it," Danos says. "They said it was as safe as dishwashing liquid. But how can that be if my mom has washed the dishes all her life and ain't got the stuff I got?"
"I was as strong as an ox, but today I can't cut my own grass. I have to ask my neighbours to do it." BP rejects these allegations. A company spokeswoman told dpa that government data as well as independent sources showed that the clean-up workers and coastal residents had not been exposed to levels high enough to cause concern.
The company, which is listed in London and New York, has nevertheless agreed to compensation payments under the terms of a deal it struck in March, just before the claims were due to go to court. Danos has undergone medical treatment at his own expense. He says he is now feeling better but is still weak. He continues to have spasms as he did before. He lost his factory job, his health insurance and his savings.
"I have three girls under (the age of) 14. Will I be able to walk everybody down the aisle when they get married? Will I be able to get the girls to college?" he wonders. The out-of-court deal concluded with the oil major, which will pay a total of 7.8 billion dollars to those affected around the Gulf, is little compensation to Danos.
Blaine Lecesne, a lawyer from Loyola University in New Orleans involved in the claims, predicts a tough battle for those claiming to have suffered ill health through the spill. "It is intrinsically difficult to prove health-related ailments in any personal injury settlement, because it's difficult to determine whether the exposure to this oil is related to the ailment that is claimed," he says.
"If you have a chronic condition, that might be vigorously contested by BP. I suspect that they are going to really aggressively contest any chronic ailments that will precipitate a large payment," Lecesne continues. "That's why they didn't go to trial. "It's not that they wanted to compensate the injured. They were looking at their survivability from a financial standpoint."
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